Blencathra

from Souter

I was thinking of going to see the chaps to check in with them between Christmas and New Year to thank them for the book but the sun was shining brightly on Blencathra as I drove by so I decided that if there was a place to park I’d walk there. Someone was pulling out of the only space as I arrived so I did a six million point turn and squeezed in. For the first time I walked the whole length of the Fell beyond the cairn and considered dropping down to Mungrisdale but in the end decided to head back the way I came, battered by the wind all the way. At one point I was sure I saw hoof prints and thought ‘Yikes! (think Scooby-doo) ... the phantom army of Souter’, but then realised that being ghosts they probably wouldn’t leave prints.

As I was cooking some of the Brancaster smoked haddock for supper I listened to more of Radio 4’s ‘Middlemarch’ that I had downloaded for my trip south. I’ve tried to read it but never got far with it but have loved listening to it. It made me wonder about the difference between reading and listening.